


Butterfly Kisses

by TheSoggySchuyler4



Series: Pieces [1]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-25
Updated: 2019-03-25
Packaged: 2019-12-07 16:17:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18237290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSoggySchuyler4/pseuds/TheSoggySchuyler4
Summary: Natasha Romanoff had been in America for four months when Mr Coulson said she had to go to school. Luckily, she had her Foster brother Clint to keep her safe.2-3 Chapters





	Butterfly Kisses

Natasha Romanoff did not like school. She hadn't actually ever been, technically, but at seven years old, she had already formed a fairly strong impression of it. School was where Clint went every day on the stupid yellow bus, leaving her all alone in the strange new house. School gave Clint homework and took up all of his time. Mr Coulson had made it clear at the beginning that there would be no pressure for her to go. He'd taken her tiny hands in his and explained, first in English, and then in Russian, that she should take all the time she needed and she could catch up in the comfort of her own home for the time being.

Mr Coulson had Lied.

Everybody lied to Natasha, so she had been nervously waiting for him to turn around and change his mind, but she hadn't expected it to be this soon. She had arrived in America nine months ago, but the first five had been spent between random Foster homes and therapists. Mr Coulson said that she'd gone through a traumatic event, and needed to recover, but after none of the conventional methods had 'worked', he'd taken her in himself.

Technically, Natasha didn't count her current activities as eavesdropping, which Clint had told her was not allowed, because the door was wide open, and neither Mr Coulson nor the strange woman with him had bothered to lower their voices. She crouched by the Grandfather clock and strained to listen in.

"... She'll at least require official testing" the woman was saying, in a crisp, voice, like institutional white paper. Natasha could practically hear Mr Couslon's frown.

"She's not ready. She barely responds to us in any capacity, and she still isn't speaking." he responded irritably.

"Phil. Your ward is seven years old. Under normal circumstances, she would have been in school for at least a year by this point."

Natasha scowled at that. When the American authorities had discovered her in a warehouse in Russia, they had asked her all sorts of questions, and she'd been unable to answer. She formed the words over and over again, both in English and Russian, and even in French when that hadn't worked, but no sounds came out. They had eventually given her some paper and a pen, and she'd been able to give her name, but no one had asked for her age.

Natasha remembered that the other girls in the Place had taunted her for having such a petite stature, brushing shoulders with the five and six year olds, instead of the seven year olds her own age. Uncle Ivan had brushed her hair and whispered that it only made her better, because no one would suspect the little runt at the back. She'd smiled at that, because Uncle Ivan wanted her to be the best, so that was what she would be.

Natasha didn't want to be the best anymore.

When Natasha had first come to America, she'd been introduced to an angry one-eyed man with a temper and a harsh name to match. He'd talked to her about the Room, as if she was responding right back. He'd spoken in German when he didn't want her to actually understand, but Natasha spoke that too. She'd learnt a lot from Mr Fury.

Mr Fury thought that she had run away, which was technically not true, but she couldn't tell him that. Her parents had died in a fire and she had been taken to an orphanage.  
"You are special, Natalia. You should not be here with these fools" Uncle Ivan had said. He'd put her in the car and driven her far away to the Room before leaving her there. Uncle Ivan had locked his marbles in a box, and forgotten them.

They'd tried to locate her parents, but when it became clear that she was all alone, they'd taken her to America. She wasn't sure why, but she was glad. Natasha hadn't liked the orphanage, or the Room. 

Mr Coulson and the lady kept talking about sending her to school, and Natasha felt her frown deepen. When Clint had described school, it had reminded her of the orphanage, and how terrified she'd been, and there'd been a heavy stone sitting in her chest that made it difficult to breathe. She hadn't liked that at all. 

She'd have to go, Mr Coulson explained later. He told her that when he'd promised otherwise, he'd forgotten a very important rule, and the lady had been reminding him that he had to follow it. Natasha stabbed her food with the knife and ran upstairs to sit in the cupboard and think. She didn't want to go to school, but Mr Coulson said that she'd be with Clint the whole time, and she wouldn't have to talk at all, so that was okay. The stone was back on her chest though, and that was bad, bad, bad.

Mr Coulson and Clint took her to buy school things, and they said she could choose anything she liked, so she picked a black Rucksack and a black pencil case, and purple hair clips, because Clint had said that was his favourite colour and she wanted to match. She violently rejected anything with red in it, because red was bad, but otherwise the trip was okay. She still couldn't make her words work. Perhaps there was a wordsmith that could fix them for her.


End file.
